Where Are the Pacific Garbage Patches? FEBRUARY 7, 2. 01. The Pacific Ocean is massive. It's the world's largest and deepest ocean, and if you gathered up all of the Earth's continents, these land masses would fit into the Pacific basin with a space the size of Africa to spare. While the Pacific Ocean holds more than half of the planet's free water, it also unfortunately holds a lot of the planet's garbage (much of it plastic). But that trash isn't spread evenly across the Pacific Ocean; a great deal of it ends up suspended in what are commonly referred to as . In the Pacific Ocean, there are actually a few . This is located in a constantly moving and changing swirl of water roughly midway between Hawaii and California, in an atmospheric area known as the North Pacific Subtropical High. NOAA National Weather Service meteorologist Ted Buehner describes the North Pacific High as involving . Over time, this has earned the area the nickname . This is the lesser known and studied, Western Pacific garbage patch. Southeast of the Kuroshio Extension (ocean current), researchers believe that this garbage patch is a small . A combination of oceanic and atmospheric forces create this convergence zone, which is positioned north of the Hawaiian Islands but moves seasonally and dips even farther south toward Hawaii during El Ni. The North Pacific Convergence Zone is an area where many open- water marine species live, feed, or migrate and where debris has been known to accumulate (Young et al. Hawaii's islands and atolls end up catching a notable amount of marine debris as a result of this zone dipping southward closer to the archipelago (Donohue et al. Pichel et al., 2. But the Pacific Ocean isn't the only ocean with marine debris troubles. Trash from humans is found in every ocean, from the Arctic (Bergmann and Klages, 2. Antarctic (Eriksson et al., 2. Atlantic Ocean and elsewhere. You can help keep trash from becoming marine debris by (of course) reducing, reusing, and recycling; by downloading the NOAA Marine Debris Tracker app for your smartphone; and by learning more at http: //marinedebris. Carey Morishige, Pacific Islands regional coordinator for the NOAA Marine Debris Program, also contributed to this post. Literature Cited. Bergmann, M. Increase of litter at the Arctic deep- sea observatory HAUSGARTEN. Marine Pollution Bulletin, 6. Donohue, M. J., R. C. Sramek, and G. A Antonelis. Derelict fishing gear in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands: diving surveys and debris removal in 1. Marine Pollution Bulletin, 4. Eriksson, C., H. Daily accumulation rates of marine debris on sub- Antarctic island beaches. Here are the basic facts about the Pacific Ocean Garbage Patch. Twice the size of Texas; Up to 9 feet deep; In the Great Pacific Ocean Gyre there is 6 times more. The trash vortex is an area the size of Texas in the North. The North Pacific gyre is one of five major ocean. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is twice the size of France. Way out in the Pacific Ocean, in an area once known as the doldrums. Marine Pollution Bulletin, 6. Howell, E., S. On North Pacific circulation and associated marine debris concentration. Marine Pollution Bulletin, 6. Morishige, C., M. Factors affecting marine debris deposition at French Frigate Shoals, Northwestern Hawaiian Islands Marine National Monument, 1. Marine Pollution Bulletin, 5. Pichel, W. G., J. H. Marine debris collects within the North Pacific Subtropical Convergence Zone . Marine Pollution Bulletin, 5. Young L. Bringing home the trash: do colony- based differences in foraging distribution lead to increased plastic ingestion in Laysan albatrosses? PLo. S ONE 4 (1. 0).
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. Archives
December 2016
Categories |